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The Earth is Born
The Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago. At that time the Earth was just a molten rock. It was surrounded by an atmosphere of helium and hydrogen. At this time there was no magnetic field. - 4.5GYA -
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Early Earth
The Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago. At that time the Earth was just a molten rock. It was surrounded by an atmosphere of helium and hydrogen. At this time there was no magnetic field -
First Life Forms
There is some debate but somewhere around 4.1 billion years ago the first simple life forms evolved on Earth - 4.1GYA -
First Photosynthesis
Around 3.5 billion years ago the first organisms to do photosynthesis appeared. - 3.5 GYA -
Plate tectonics start and Continents begin to appear
Around 3 billion years ago plate tectonics start and continents begin to appear. - 3GYA -
First cells with nucleus
Around 2.7 billion years ago the first cells which have a nucleus appear. - 2.7 GYA -
The great oxidation event
Photosynthesis by organisms began to start putting breathable oxygen in the atmosphere in significant amounts around 2.4 billion years ago. Slowly the atmosphere changed to contain a lot more oxygen. - 2.4GYA -
The first sexual reproduction
No one knows exactly when sexual reproduction started but by 1. billion years ago there is fossil evidence of sexual reproduction. - 1.2 GYA -
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Snowball Earth
The entire earth was covered in huge sheets of ice. 850MYA - 650MYA -
First multicellular life
Around 600 million years ago there is evidence of the first multicellular lifeforms. - 600 MYA -
The Cambrian explosion
535 million years ago there was a explosion of evolution and new types of life. - 535 MYA -
First moss
The first land plants like mosses appeared around 470 million years ago. This was during a time called the Ordovician period when life was diversifying rapidly. Non vascular plants like types of moss and liverworts didn't have deep roots and therefore could live easily. (The photo is some moss in my front yard!) - 470 MYA -
Plants colonize the land
Plants taking over the land, changing the entire landscape of the world. 465MYA -
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Ordovician period
Lots of life in this period until another ice age covers most of the earth with ice, many organisms died out. It is the second biggest mass extinction. 460MYA to 430MYA -
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The first mass extinction
Most species still lived in the sea, but The mass extinction caused 80 percent of all life to go extinct 460-430 MYA -
Early diversification of land plants
Early diversification of land plants. - 430 MYA -
First tree
The first tree is likely a species called Wattieza. Some of these fossils have been discovered in New York State dating way back to around 385 million years ago. Before this discovery, a tree called Archaeopteris was considered to be the first known tree on Earth. - 385MYA (This is a photo I took of a tree in my yard) -
First animals on land
Around 375 million years ago the first animals that could walk on land evolved from fish, these were simple animals similar to todays salamanders. - 375 MYA -
The beginning of reptiles
320 million years ago the first reptiles were on land with advantages like tough skin and hard shelled eggs that don't need to be kept in water. Some of these were 4.5 meter long reptiles that were the dominant land animal on earth at the time. - 320 MYA -
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Pangea
For the finial time all of the continents came together to form one continent, known as a super-continent. This lasted from 300 MYA to 175MYA -
Permian Extinction
This time is the Great Dying or the Great Permian Extinction. Many species became extinct. It happened about 252 million years ago. It is the boundary between the Permian and Triassic periods, and also between the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras. - 252MYA -
First Mammals
The first mammal we know of was a small shrew like animal that grabbed insects from ferns that were lining the shores of freshwater lakes. - 220 MYA -
Triassic Extinction
The Triassic Extinction could have been caused by climate change or possibly by a huge asteroid striking earth. - 201MYA -
First birds on earth
Scientists have actually recently discovered a bird even older then the bird we previously thought was the oldest bird to be on earth. The feathered Aurornis xui is about 10 million years older than the much more famous Archaeopteryx. The line between birds and dinosaurs is very close, it is hard to know where one starts and the other ends. - 160MYA -
Flowering Plants
The oldest discovered flowering plant on earth is the aquatic plant Montsechia vidalii. It is 130 million years old. It was found in Spain in 2015! Some scientists think flowering plants first appeared on earth much earlier than like maybe sometime between 250 and 140 million years ago. - 130MYA -
Death of Dinosaurs
65 million years ago the last of the dinosaurs went extinct. Plankton, the base of the ocean's food chain, took a very hard hit. Many families of brachiopods and sea sponges became extinct. The remaining ammonites disappeared. In total more than half of the world's species were killed off forever. - 65 MYA -
First grass plants
Recent studies have showed grass existed on Earth at least 10 million years earlier than we used to believe. A new discovery of fossilized dinosaur dung showed real evidence that some dinosaurs ate grass. 66-55MYA (The photo I took myself in my yard). -
First Primates
The animals in the primate family, or proto primates evolved in the Paleocene Epoch at the start of the Cenozoic Era. They were kind of like squirrels and tree shrews in size and the way they looked. - 60-55MYA -
The Rocky Mountains form
The Rocky Mountains when a number of plates began sliding underneath the North American plate. The very shallow angle of subduction made these large mountains come up along western North America. - 70-40MYA -
First Hominids
Hominids are a family of primates that includes eight extant species. Scientists believe that humans all evolved from animals like this. - 13-7MYA -
First giraffe
From what we know the giraffes ancestors first appeared in central Asia roughly 15 million years ago. - 15 MYA -
First domesticated bananas
There is a lot of debate on what the first fruit on earth was. Some horticulturists think that the banana was the earth's very first fruit. Banana plants have been grown by people since the start of recorded history. One of the first records of bananas dates all the way back to Alexander the Great in India where he first discovered bananas. 327BCE = 2345YA -
First domesticated elephants
The oldest known records of domesticated elephants date back to about 4,000 years ago. An Asian elephant species called Elephas Maximus is the first known domesticated elephant. They were used in what is now Pakistan/India around - 4000 YA (This is a photo I took of my parents on an Elephant in India a few years ago) -
First Modern Humans
Modern humans appeared about 200,000 years ago their brains were a similar size to our brains today. There is still a lot of debate about when these Modern humans begin to show creative and symbolic thinking. - 200 000YA -
First Lions
The single species of lion that exists today is called Panthera leo. Scientists think it evolved in Eastern-Southern Africa sometime around 124,000 years ago. - 124 000YA -
First car
The gasoline engine was developed by Carl Benz. It was a one cylinder two stroke and on New Years Eve 1879 it made history by working for the first time. 140YA -
First surfing
When surfing got showed in the late 18th century in Tahiti and Hawaii, Europeans were completely shocked and were quite impressed. This sport has spread all across the world and it is very popular and known today. - 300YA -
First Man on the Moon
Just about 50 years ago on, July 16 1969 the Spacecraft Apollo 11 blasted off of earth . Four days later astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon in the Lunar Module. - 49YA -
First Dogs
We believe the world's first ever dog was a large canine that lived 31,700 years ago and subsisted on a diet of mostly horse, musk ox and reindeer. - 31,700YA (This is a photo I took of my dog). -
First Human Civilizations
Sumer, which is located in Mesopotamia, is the very first known human civilization ever with any complexity. These first city states developed around 5000-4000BCE = 7000 - 6000 YA -
First Hip Hop Music
"Rapper's Delight" was a single by the American hip-hop trio The Sugarhill Gang. it came out in 1979 and although it was not the first single ever to feature rapping, it is generally considered to be the main song that first popularized hip-hop in the United States and around the rest of the world. This is only 40 years ago!
